“I don’t know,” Ken said. “Even though she’s been my wife for almost two years, Lila’s unpredictable.”
“What about you?”
“Who knows? Sometimes I think I’m still in high school, chasing the cheerleader. Sick, huh? I’m almost thirty, so why am I still playing that game? On the other hand, it’s like I’m still on the varsity team. Okay, it’s NFL, but the life is not a hell of a lot different. Everything is still about winning and losing.”
Todd didn’t say anything. It was too close; Lila and Jessica had been best friends since grade school. He always thought they were too much alike. Now he hoped he was wrong, but there were undeniable similarities, enough of them to make him a little nervous.
Was this just high school for him, too? That whirlwind of sexual obsession and heart-ripping passion that charged in and knocked you out of reality? Sometimes it was worse, ripping up everything around you leaving nothing but destruction and broken lives.
Just because you admit it doesn’t absolve you, he told himself, then gave himself a little leeway. It helped to know he was aware.
“Of course, if you want a better scoop,” Ken was saying, “you could always ask Caroline. By the way, Jessica was beautiful the other night, the way she chewed her out. Of course, it doesn’t really make any difference. Nothing stops Caroline. Jessica gave it to Lila, too. And she wasn’t all wrong.”
He had to admit Jessica was good that night. She surprised him with her strength. It was almost like what Elizabeth would have done. Bad job, comparing them.
Stay light.
“Jessica asked me if I thought Caroline would come to the wedding.”
“Are you kidding?” Ken laughed. “She wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
Todd stopped and, leaning over, he put his hands on his knees and took some deep breaths. Ken waited on the side and watched him. Between breaths, Todd said, “Desk job. Went from a player to a watcher.”
“Miss it?”
“Yeah, but I miss a lot of things.”
“Can’t tell by looking at you.”
That came in handy, Todd’s laidback demeanor. He was always hard to read. He’d never needed that talent more than he did when Jessica first came back from France and was staying with Elizabeth and him.
My head is pounding from Jessica’s endless why-I’m-leaving-Regan stories. Turns out he’s a monster, or she thinks he is, anyway. Of course Elizabeth, the big, protective sister, goes with anything she says.
Just hearing his name bugs me. I don’t know if I buy all the monster stories, but no matter, I don’t like him. Right from the get-go I thought he sucked. He was arrogant, too full of himself, and looked like a dumb mistake that only Jessica could make.
Yeah, I’m angry, and I don’t even know why. The last thing I want is to find out.
The combination of my deadline for the second of a three-part series, which, of course, passed last week, and the guest is getting to me.
Ah, the guest. How do I avoid her? Not easy in this small house, but lucky for me she’s been out mostly, busy running around, seeing all her old friends.
It’s ten thirty in the morning and I’m closing in on my computer. Physically getting to it, I mean, but I’m not there yet; I’m still reading the newspaper at the kitchen table. And Jessica is still asleep in the guest bedroom just down the hall from my office.
A couple of minutes ago I heard sounds, moving-around sounds, closet doors opening, footsteps, and general waking sounds coming from Jessica’s bedroom. She’s been staying here for more than a week, and it’s still no easier. Hey, I’m totally over her, but she’ll always make me uncomfortable.
That almost stopped me from marrying Elizabeth. Not that I don’t love her, because I do. Who could not love Elizabeth? But with her as my wife, it’s a package deal; Jessica will always be around someplace.
I liked it better when she was married and off in France.
Maybe one day this whole thing will fall into perspective—all about being young and dumb combined with too much to drink—and it’ll fade into a vague memory, always unpleasant but not torturous.
Or am I letting myself off the hook too easily?
Maybe it’s really not that important. When I’m forty and look back, is it going to look like a mistake that didn’t have legs, that just went away, or a life-altering event?
It doesn’t look like it was that important to Jessica. It was probably just another nothing fling that, no doubt, she regrets. After all, it was her sister. But she’s probably found a way to rationalize it so it comes out looking like an alcohol-based indiscretion.
Wouldn’t she be stunned if she knew all the time I spend agonizing over that month.
Like this morning. This morning was another one of those tremendous times in bed with Elizabeth that got spoiled when Elizabeth mentioned her name.
I can’t let myself get caught in this shit, so instead I grab my jacket and head out the kitchen door to my car. I look like a thief escaping from a crime the way I run down the driveway. Head down and shoulders hunched, I fling myself into the front seat, turn the key, ram the car into first, and speed off. To safety.
I would dearly love to stay away all day, but I’ve got this serious deadline I’m already late for, so I just pick up a coffee at the Coffee Bean and head back.
My first piece of the three-part series for the Sweet Valley News comes out tomorrow. I could work at the newspaper office, but then they would see that I was just starting the second piece. That would really put them on my back. I suffer from deadlineitis. The minute I get the assignment—it could be three weeks in advance—I start suffering and planning excuses for being late.
Actually, having Jessica in the house should be good discipline. It should keep me locked away in my office, where I have no choice but to work. Or YouTube some old game or watch porn. Wouldn’t be the first time.
When I pull up the driveway, I can see Jessica in the kitchen reading a magazine. There’s no way to avoid her. She has to have seen the car, so I have no choice but to come in the back way through the kitchen; otherwise it’s too obvious that I’m avoiding her. Only strangers use the front door.
Since Jessica is Jessica, totally involved in her own feelings, I figure she probably isn’t even aware of my angst. After all, the whole thing happened more than five years ago and was so quick, only a month. I was probably one of a lot of guys who fell for Jessica over the years. It was almost a natural rite of passage. That’s all. Kids’ stuff.
But I can’t fool my own responses, and even thinking about that time sends a quick, disgusted shudder shooting through my body. How could I do that? I still don’t know. I quickly shake my head like that could wipe out the thoughts.
Instead, I force myself to think about this morning, about making love to Elizabeth, about the deep, satisfying warmth of that love, of her soft, pliant, trusting body in my arms. Mistake. That only makes the guilt all the worse.
As it happens, I was wrong. Jessica didn’t see me. In fact, she’s so involved in her magazine that she doesn’t even hear me coming until I open the door, and then she jumps and lets out a little yelp.
“Hey, sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” I am really sorry, but still it was kind of funny the way she jumped. I give a little laugh.
She does, too, and it’s the first comfortable, natural response either of us has had since she arrived last week. I’m still smiling because it really was a funny sight and because, despite myself, I like the comfort.
But our smiles dissipate, and there’s a sharp drop into silence. The chasm between us, deep and dark, reopens.
“I have to work,” I say, and it comes out stronger than I meant, like I’m blaming her for keeping me. Without waiting for a response, I walk out of the room toward my office.
“Yeah, right. Like I’m stopping you,” she says, almost under her breath.
But I hear and, turning to look back, say, “You don’t anything me.”
I d
on’t know why she makes me so angry, but she does.
Maybe I’m the one who doesn’t belong here.
Ken was sensitive enough not to ask Todd any questions about how it was going with Elizabeth. Like, was there going to be a rapprochement between the sisters? Was Elizabeth coming in for the wedding? All the things he’d have to wait for Caroline to tell everyone.
They managed to have a good conversation over the next hour, a half hour down to town and a half hour back, without anything too personal. Only guys can do that.
When they hit downtown Sweet Valley it was closed up tight. The main street was almost empty except for some shopkeepers hosing down the front of their shops. Without the girls in UGGs and the guys in jeans, it could be right out of an old MGM movie of a small mid-twentieth-century town in the Midwest, where everything was clean and safe. And happy.
* * *
Actually, Sweet Valley still retained a lot of those qualities. It was probably one of the reasons Jessica didn’t want to leave. She wanted this life for herself and for her children.
People thought she would be the first one to escape to the big city, L.A. or New York. And she did, with Regan, but truth be told, she hadn’t liked it. She missed Sweet Valley and all the people, even the ones she didn’t like so much.
Maybe Todd fell in there someplace. Those couple of weeks when she first came back from France and was living in the same house with Todd were excruciating. Sometimes explosive, like the day they were alone in the house, both desperately trying to avoid each other. She had to wait for him to leave the house before she could safely sit in the kitchen and read instead of being trapped in her bedroom.
But then he came back unexpectedly. And he was so nasty he practically accused her of standing in the way of his work. She’d shot right back with the same bite.
“Yeah, right. Like I’m stopping you,” I say, almost under my breath. But he hears me and turns around and says with a really nasty look on his face, “You don’t anything me.”
How dare he say that to me. You don’t anything me!
I’m sitting there, in the kitchen, fuming until I can’t sit anymore. I tear down the hallway to his office. The door is closed, but I’m way too angry to knock—that feels too supplicant—so I go straight to my bedroom, grab my purse, and storm out the front door, where I practically run into Caroline Pearce. In fact, she’s blocking my way with her big, ugly body.
“Wow! Lovers’ quarrel?” Caroline says.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Sorry.” But, of course, no one could be less sorry. “I thought you were Elizabeth,” Caroline says, running her hand through the new growth of red hair that’s just beginning to grow back after her chemotherapy.
“You’re sick,” I say. Then it hits me: She really is. But I’m still annoyed at her. I say, “You know what I meant.”
I suppose anyone else might have spent a little more time like trying to rectify that unkind error, but unfortunately for Caroline, she hit the wrong sister.
“Elizabeth’s not home?” Caroline asks. “How about Todd?”
I don’t even answer. Or look back. I just race over to my rented Mustang convertible. Hey, I still have the credit cards. Knowing Regan, probably not for long.
No question that he hates me. Todd, I mean. Not in front of Elizabeth, but if she isn’t watching, it’s like loathing. Like it was all my fault and he wasn’t part of it.
It’s not true. It was both of us. Crazy. Horrible.
Until he didn’t.
Being far away helped, but it wasn’t a cure, only a palliative. I’m too impatient for palliatives.
I have to get out of here.
I spent the last week seeing everyone I wanted to see and lots I didn’t want to see. I even spent time with like Winston, who expected me to fall head over heels for him. Well, over my heels anyway. But I’ve so had it with rich men. Besides, he’ll always be the class clown to me—except now he’s become a decidedly unfunny clown, egotistical and arrogant. A real prick.
No place to go, nothing to do, just sit around and wait for Regan to call and then not answer the phone. Strangely enough, he hasn’t called, which is way creepier than if he did. The silence is unnerving. How long before he decides to come out here? Except that I don’t think his pride and vanity will let him. No, Regan is definitely not the sort of man to chase a woman. Besides, he’s probably still stunned that I would leave him—wonderful, rich, gorgeous him. On the other hand, he isn’t a man used to losing.
That last thought like unnerves me. The power that originally attracted me to him, redirected, could be very scary.
Right now, there’s no good place for me. But the best of the no-good places is here, with Elizabeth. At least it’s best for me.
And there I go again, selfish Jessica, always wrapping the world around myself.
What can I do? Twenty-seven is too late to change. Besides, I have some good qualities. My best one is that I love Elizabeth. I would give up my life for my sister. I almost did. One time when we were in high school, this lunatic madman came at her with a sledgehammer. I jumped in between them, and I didn’t even have a weapon. All I had was crazy fury and determination to save my sister’s life.
And later, afterward, I knew I really would have sacrificed my life for my sister, and that gave me way the best feeling about myself I have ever had.
So how could I ever explain the Todd thing to her?
I drive the two blocks over to Lila Fowler’s house. Even though Lila is my longtime best friend, we actually haven’t seen much of each other since I left Sweet Valley, but like old friends, five minutes together and we’re back in high school.
But Lila isn’t home. The housekeeper says she’s at the hairdresser. A place called Dario’s at the new mall between the Gap and Starbucks, not the first Starbucks, the third one.
I have a little trouble finding the right place since there’s a Starbucks next to almost everything now. I find the hairdresser, but Lila isn’t there and not expected. No doubt she’s out screwing someone. According to Caroline probably my own brother, Steven, the shit. Not that I can afford to take such a disapproving position on infidelity, but it’s different for me; I’m in control. Steven’s the kind who falls in love. Men are no good at keeping cheating in its place. And thanks to Caroline, everyone knows everything. Except my pathetic sister-in-law, Cara Walker Wakefield. At least she would be home. Baking probably. Baking certainly.
They say the wife is the last to know. But like who’s going to tell her? What a momentous, Godlike thing to take on, bringing news that could demolish someone’s life. Who has the right to do that? What if she still loves him? Of course, I always think I would want to know.
Would Elizabeth want to know?
No way.
So everyone knows about Steven’s infidelities and no one tells Cara.
I can’t go back to the house and spend the entire afternoon avoiding Todd. That’s totally depressing. Instead, I drive downtown to see if I can find anyone to mess with.
Downtown Sweet Valley hasn’t changed that much since my high school days. The big changes happened before, in the late eighties. It had been years since the little shops were driven out by the malls and supermarkets, and I can hardly remember what Sweet Valley looked like back then. Which is depressing because I’d like to go back in time. Life was wonderful and simple when I was queen of the prom, when all that seemed to matter was how cute you were? And I was very cute. Just thinking about those days that are so gone so depresses me. Everything depresses me today. Especially my own life. The only cure is a drive out to the beach.
They say Sweet Valley is only fifteen minutes to the shore, but that’s on those rare days when for some inexplicable reason, there’s no traffic. Fortunately, today is one of the good days.
It is, in fact, a gorgeous, sunny day. Well, it is Southern California, but still it’s especially clear today. And it’s especially nice to be out of contact. I left my c
ell phone at the house. It’s probably the first time in months that I have been totally unreachable, completely free. Textless. Even Regan can’t find me. No one can find me. But then, who would want to find me?
That thought almost wipes out the sunshine and puts me back into the funk.
I make it to the beach in less than twenty minutes, and it looks almost empty. Lots of parking.
A nice walk along the beach will cure everything, right? Not my problems. But it’s nice to take off my shoes and toe kick the sand down to the water’s edge. But not in the water. It’s always too cold in California. Like you got all those miles of gorgeous beaches and you didn’t really want to go in. Even in the summertime.
I’m not three minutes into my cure when I see a familiar figure about a hundred feet away. It’s a body I would know anywhere, even from the back: broad shoulders, neat waist, good legs. So many men have spindly legs, but not him. And they’re in great shape and not too hairy. In fact, he’s an absolute hunk, even if he is my brother.
Maybe he’s just the right person to cheer me up today. Oh, God, no. He’s with Lila. Not that I can see her; Steven’s body is blocking her, but I see the way his hands are resting on her shoulders, then drop down, caressing her arms. Of course it’s Lila. Thanks to Caroline, it isn’t like it’s really a secret. Besides, of all people they can trust, I’m the one: his sister and Lila’s best friend.
I so need the company. I start walking down the beach toward them, but neither of them sees me. When I’m about twenty feet away, they turn.
It is Steven, but it isn’t Lila.
I’m stunned. It can’t be! It’s not possible! Not Steven!
I read his face. He’s as stunned as I am. And then there’s a flash of disappointment. I’m not Elizabeth.
No one moves. Not me, not Steven, and not Aaron Dallas. In fact, Steven’s hand is still on Aaron’s arm.
Sweet Valley Confidential: Ten Years Later Page 12
